Apple Cider Wine Questions

[Zog]

My first batch ever of non-kit wine is from 3 gallons of apple cider we pressed with some friends. It has been fermenting for a week. I have a couple questions:

At what temperature range should I keep the primary fermenter?

Second question is a bit more complicated. The starting SG was 1.097 after I added sugar (a bit too much I think). I tested it yesterday and it was already down to 1.02. I would like the finished wine to be still and slightly sweet. Can the fermentation be stopped when the SG is around 1.01 or a little less? Would sorbate and k-meta stop it? If so, how do I go about that? Or is the better approach is to let the wine ferment down to dry, then stabilize and clear it and then re-sweeten it to taste before bottling? If I let it ferment down to dry I think the alcohol level is going to be pushing 14%. That's higher than I would like, but not a huge deal

Thanks.

 

[lloyd]

I have let it ferment to dry then back sweeten. Sweet wines are a challenge for me. because the alcohol/sugar balance is harder to achieve if you get enough alcohol to kill the yeast you might have a wine that is to sweet. and it will take forever for it to finish fermenting as the fermenting slows down considerably as it reaches the point where it will kill the yeast. Fermenting to dry then adding your sugar and potassium sorbate (wine conditioner) will give you much better control over your final alcohol level and your sweetness. hopefully others will also give you some feed back on this.

 

[Julie]

lloyd is right you need to let it ferment to dry, then stabilize and backsweeten. Yes the alcohol content might be a little high what you could do is when you stabilize, you could add some apple juice concentrate, this would lower your ABV some and sweeten it as well.

 

[Runningwolf]

Agreeing with the above posts. Ferment dry and backsweeten as Julie suggested.

Ideas; instead of using Apple Juice use Cranberry or cranapple and back sweeten up to 1.03. Just my own thoughts to ponder.

 

[Zog]

Thanks for the ideas!

I stabilized it a couple weeks ago at 0.998 after the fermentation seemed to have stalled out. Racked it twice to get rid of the sediment. To keep this as close to a local product as I can, I'm thinking about sweetening it with some fresh (pasteurized) cider to boost the apple flavor and sweetness. Does this risk re-fermentation? Maybe I should simmer the fresh stuff down to concentrate the sweetness and flavor so as to not water down the wine. I'd like to get it back up to a semi-dry wine... between 1.0 and 1.01. I don't have any way to figure how much to add to achieve this... other than adding it really slowly and keep testing it. Any ideas how to calculate that?

 

[Old Philosopher]

You said a 3 gallon batch. My first batch was almost identical to yours.
I used one 16 oz can of frozen, 100% concentrate. That not only acted as a flavor pack, but had enough sugar in it to get me back up around SG 1.01.
The end result didn't last long enough to get bottled.

 

[Arne]

You said a 3 gallon batch. My first batch was almost identical to yours.
I used one 16 oz can of frozen, 100% concentrate. That not only acted as a flavor pack, but had enough sugar in it to get me back up around SG 1.01.
The end result didn't last long enough to get bottled.

LOL, the old best taste it one more time before we bottle it, and again and again, been there done that. Arne.

 

[Old Philosopher]

LOL, the old best taste it one more time before we bottle it, and again and again, been there done that. Arne.

The only stuff I've made in the past year that's made it into bottles was the blueberry vinegar! Hahaha!